76
THE NEW YORKER, APRIL 11, 2016
cruise along: the finest car-based ensem-
ble since the rendition of "Bohemian
Rhapsody" at the start of "Wayne's
World." Even the movie's title is snatched
from a Van Halen track---and, yes, those
exclamation marks are correct, welded
on like twin mu ers. Linklater's aim is
not merely to embed himself in the pe-
riod but to feed the alacrity of those who
gyrate across the floor of his film. Led---
or led on---by Finn, they seem as con-
tent beneath a glitter ball, or in cowboy
hats at a square dance, as they are in a
batting cage. They never say never to
anything: "This is the best day of my life,
until tomorrow," McReynolds says. Every
tune is welcome, as a suitable soundtrack
to their jinks.
Is there a plot here? Only in the
form of a running gag: dates and times
posted in a corner of the screen, as in a
palm-sweating thriller. "Sunday. . pm.
Class starts: hr min.," and so on.
In all, the boys have a long weekend to
fill. For Jake, that precious span is dis-
tilled into the time that he spends with
Beverly, a performing-arts major: the
only female presence of any depth in
the story, but wise beyond her years, and
so beautifully played by Zoey Deutch
(looking very like her mother, Lea
Thompson, in "Back to the Future")
that she grants the film the breathing
space---and the break from testoster-
one---that it needs. Linklater barely puts
a foot wrong, and he shows that a movie
about happiness can be cogent and ro-
bust, rather than sappy or wispy; and
yet, for all its gambolling mischief, "Ev-
erybody Wants Some!!" leaves us with
plenty to rue. As Jake and Beverly drift
and chat, in a languorous dawn swim,
we feel a hit of paradise, no sooner peak-
ing than it begins to fade, and the final
shot of the film is not just funny and
sleepy but touched with a melancholy
truth, of which Jake and his compan-
ions are but dimly aware. For these young
Americans, the past few days have been
their waking life, cranked up to the max,
and everything to come---the serious
task of studying, graduating, and grow-
ing up---will be a dream.
O , a dapper gentle-
man, in jacket and tie, strolls
across a street. He approaches a woman
in white. "I'm Miles Davis," he says.
"I know," she replies. He writes his
phone number on a twenty-dollar bill.
"Now you don't have to stare," he adds,
and she laughs. Her name is Frances
Taylor (Emayatzy Corinealdi), and
she will later marry him; how could
she not, after a moment like that? The
sequence is one of the plainest, and
the best, in "Miles Ahead," a new
movie---and an unmistakable labor of
love---by Don Cheadle. He directed
it; he co-wrote the screenplay, with
Steven Baigelman; and he stars as
Miles Davis.
The praiseworthy plan, for this film,
is to disrupt the standard trudge of
the bio-pic. No scarring childhood,
no early struggles, no blaze of revela-
tion. "If you're going to tell a story,
come with some attitude, man," Davis
declares at the beginning. Aside from
flashbacks, much of the action is set
in the late nineteen-seventies, during
an infamous doldrum, in which he
pretty much sailed o the musical
map. We see him stuck in his New
York apartment, his features gaunt and
despairing under a sweaty halo of hair.
Cheadle has always been the most
agile of actors, tough to keep up with
as he switches from menacing still-
ness to a snapping wit; in short, he is
made for Davis, and there's no doubt
that he nails his hero, down to the raw
rasp of his speech.
Why, then, to one's regret, does
"Miles Ahead" falter? Largely because
of the plot, in which a bedraggled hack
(Ewan McGregor) goes to interview
the reclusive Davis, and tries to pur-
loin a reel of recorded tape.The whole
saga, complete with shootings and a
car chase, is cooked up for the film.
Meanwhile, when it comes to those
with whom Davis worked so fruitfully
to forge what he calls "social music,"
we get nothing of Dizzy Gillespie or
John Coltrane, say, and only the odd
glimpse of Gil Evans ( Je rey Gro-
ver). Was it really worth ditching them
for the sake of this invented folderol?
And given that Davis's worshipful fans
will be pained by the lacunae, while
the uninitiated stare at this shambles
of a man, awash in drink and drugs,
and wonder what the fuss was about,
whom is this movie for?
NEWYORKER.COM
Richard Brody blogs about movies.
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